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What does Steve Bould actually do at Arsenal?

In every organization, including Arsenal PLC, there are structures! There are positions to be filled by people who are considered competent enough to fill them. Before you are employed into such posts, a screening or testing process would have been carried out to determine if you truly fit to occupy such a post.

In football, we have what we call the coaching crew. The coaching crew consists of the team manager, the assistant manager, the fitness coach, the medical team and others. For you to occupy any of these posts, you must have undergone a training or learning process, while also having on the field experience. A football coach is expected to have a coaching license or badge, which he must have earned in a coaching school. His assistant is also expected to have such requirements.

Great football coaches have given testimonies to how important their assistants have been, a winning team is usually the team where the manager constantly shares ideas and tips with his assistant. Coaches like Mourinho, Guardiola and Ancelotti, are known to be comfortable working with certain persons who assist them in their jobs. They don’t go coaching any club without taking their assistants with them. That is how important an assistant coach is.

At Arsenal, I sometimes wonder what role Steve Bould plays in the team! He was a good defender during his playing days and he played the game professionally. When he came to Arsenal to replace Pat Rice, the immediate former assistant coach, it was expected that he was coming to do a job on the Arsenal defence. It was expected that he was coming to organize the defence and teach the defenders how to do a good job, defence wise! Critically analyzing how Arsenal defenders have played this season so far, one will be forced to ask what Steve Bould is really doing at Arsenal? Is it a case of him talking and Wenger refusing to listen? Does he get consulted for ideas on how to organize the defence? Is Wenger not comfortable with him or what? If his contributions are not being felt in the team, what is happening then?

We need to know what is really happening in Arsenal. If Steve Bould is not functioning well as an assistant, won’t it be better he is relieved of his duty instead of paying him for nothing? I feel our defenders can play better if they are tutored better, so why are they not playing better than what they are offering us now? Don’t we need answers to what Steve Bould’s functions at Arsenal are?

16 thoughts on “What does Steve Bould actually do at Arsenal?”

Absolutely pathetic. When was the last time team won a trophy and the asst manager was the main reason behind it?

Arsene is in charge. This is really a simple scenario. We need to stop analysing pointless aspects. The asst manager, players blah blah. If it’s a problem Wenger should fix it and take responsibility instead of dithering all the time

Hell Yeah!….. Me think Bouldy is under some kinda spell…. All he does is sit around chewing bubblegum speechlessly
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He never tweaks nor freak out when we are hammered (and the defence scattered all over the place)
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Bouldy is in bondage…he needs to be freed
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So who will bell the cat?

Kyle Martino (NBCSN) said it best after we got arse r@ped by West Brom: “… and then there’s Steve Bould who I’m not convinced isn’t a statue”. Yes, I know many of you will say that he’s Arsene’s man, and he follows his instructions/directions. But he’s supposed to be our defensive guru. Does he not go over those defensive tactics with the players? Does he not watch them in training? Does he not explain to them how to defend set pieces? He’s got a job, and I’m sure he gets paid handsomely for it. Unfortunately, I have no idea what this job entails, as I see zero results on the pitch. Our defense has been atrocious this season, and Bould should definitely take some responsibility for it (along with Wenger and players too, of course).

He actually isn’t our defensive guru. The club has defensive coaches. He is the assistant manager and his job is to support Wenger in the running of the first. He has no power. Is that a shock to hear? No not really because there is no job that begins with the word Assistant that has power.

As an Assistant, he carries a lot of power. The power is being used unwisely by being a yes man to the fossil. He never gets up in a game no matter what is happening in the pitch. As an example Giggs was always up and shouting for Manu games.
When wenger signs he will have a speech ready saying how much he loves the club – I wish one of the reporter can ask him live, if he is signing because he is going to earn 20 million pounds in two years. If that is his main reason?

Give him a job working with the under 16 to 18 defenders. I’d actually like if our young CB’s had someone like himself Adams & Campbell teaching them the stuff that most coaches/managers don’t teach.

If Arsene is staying, which he is, well then you’d need someone whom he respects. Stoichkov might be a good idea, Arsene speaks fondly of him and they see the game similar, he might talk Arsene into allowing coaches a more hands on role.

Don’t stop there, cherry-pick the top trainers (from all over) and treat them like they know what they’re doing, and don’t have them just act out what you’ve instructed them to do, in that case you may as well keep every cheque for yourself Arsene. These people will have picked up things that Arsene hasn’t, that’s what happens with a different education. The lads, whichever one’s are staying, it will be good for them to hear some new ideas.

I think it’s important that they, the players, don’t go on listening to the same old instructions and being shown the same tired examples that are after having proved a failure.

He was our youth coach before he stepped up to the first team. He did tighten up our defence at first, but since he took over from Pat Rice, who wasn’t a bad defender in his day, he really shouldn’t have needed to.